Richard Oliver Johnson told his brother that he had found the putrid, decaying remains of a woman inside a “box.”

Largely a skeleton with patches of shriveled skin, the body was curled up inside a white Rubbermaid container in the backyard of Johnson’s home at 1325 N. Lansing St. A stream of ants had invaded. His brother made the 911 call to police.

The following is an account of how Aurora police including Det. Steve Conner, who often investigates the city’s cold case murders, doggedly followed the case even after prosecutors from former Arapahoe County District Attorney Carol Chambers’ office twice refused to file charges.

Most of the facts in this narrative are based on a March 10, 2014, court affidavit. It was filed in connection to the arrest last week of Jon David Harrington on a charge of second-degree murder. Harrington is being held in the Arapahoe County Jail.

Back in the early 2000s, Johnson spent a lot of time with his close friend Harrington. He called his friend by a nickname, “JD.”

Shortly after Johnson first met JD, his friend moved to an apartment at 1549 Nome St.

In January 2002, a female co-worker named “Carolyn” moved in with him. The two worked together at a Waffle House near Interstate 70 three years earlier. Carolyn asked Harrington if she could room with him. Her husband had beaten her up. Carolyn offered to pay part of the rent. JD told Johnson it was strictly a business arrangement. No romance.

Months after Carolyn moved in with JD, Johnson learned that the arrangement wasn’t going so well.

JD called and told Johnson that Carolyn had stole rent money from him.

A few days later, JD called again. This time Harrington said he was being evicted from his apartment. Harrington asked Johnson if he could store his belongings at Johnson’s house.

She matter-of-factly described the most agonizing event of her young life and yet the understated message was packed with emotion.

When Tishauna carries her backpack with textbooks each day to Silver Hills Middle School in Westminster the heaviest load the A-student carries is grief. She must somehow manage to study knowing that the person who killed her mother and “best friend” hasn’t been brought to justice.

Someone killed the Angel in her life.

“It’s not like my mother died of a natural cause. She was murdered,” Tishauna said.

Angel Thomas’ murder struck a chord with me in more than the way Tishauna had personalized it for me.

Kirk Mitchell is a general assignment reporter at The Denver Post who focuses on criminal justice stories. He began working at the newspaper in 1998, after writing for newspapers in Mesa, Ariz., and Twin Falls, Idaho, and The Associated Press in Salt Lake City. Mitchell first started writing the Cold Case blog in Fall 2007, in part because Colorado has more than 1,400 unsolved homicides.